As a family tradition, my Christmas's were spent at my great aunt's house. We would arrive on the 23/24th of December. I would hardly say hello to my family before I would run to the tree and count my gifts. How many envelopes in the tree had my name on them? How many big Christmas presents were under the tree? Did Santa come yet with my gift?
We would then head off St. Peter's Catholic Church for Christmas Eve Mass and when we returned I got into my Christmas pj's, usually the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles' kind, and beg the parents to open at least one gift.
As you can see, even at the age of 33 very little has changed!
(Pictured: My nephew, Liam and I showing off our new TMNT pj's. Beware of mean green fighting machines!)
And then it happened! Christmas day would come. It was the one day of the year that I would get up before my dad excited to start the day! Why? Because I would get gifts!!! What a great way to start any day! I would wake up my sisters and parents, aunt's and uncles, grandparents, and cousins. Today was the highly anticipated day. And being the baby of the family you can understand how the day somehow revolved around me! :)
I would plow through my gifts one at a time! But my folks ingrained in me a very important lesson that I constantly have to remind myself of to this day.
When I would anxiously tear through the wrapping paper, I would ignore the Christmas tag that mentioned who the gift was from. My parents, gently would stop me and say, "Now Michael, who is that gift from?". I would then rustle and scavenge through the torn paper to find out who it was from. I then proceeded to leave the gift behind, run to the person who gave me the gift, and say, "thank you, thank you, thank you!"
My parents taught me that the gift is not as important as the Giver of the gift! And sometimes I have to remind myself, like Christmas day as a kid, I get more attached to the gift then the giver of the gift.
As I continue to try to grow in my faith I have come to notice times in my prayer life where I can feel the Lord's presence and many times when I don't feel His presence at all! It actually confuses many college students, who have a great experience on a retreat only later to discover that the so called "retreat high" slowly fades away. What accounts for these changes of feelings and experiences?
Well, we have to understand, even the feeling of God's presence is a gift. The presence of God is not God, Himself. We see this in the Scriptures, Christ proclaims Psalm 22 on the cross, "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me." Did God the Father, abandon Christ on the cross? The answer of course is No! But did Christ feel the absence of God the Father on the Cross? The answer is yes!
When the gift is removed, we have the opportunity to still choose the Giver of the gift! For who wants a friendship to be based solely on the basis of what gifts one can receive? Seems kind of selfish and childish, like when I was a kid on Christmas day; where I was solely focused on the gifts I was to receive, not the the family that surrounded me on Christmas day!
The Lord gives us many gifts: from talents, skills, to friends and family, to even the feeling of His presence in our lives, but just like any gift, the Lord will take these gifts away, either rapidly like a torn band-aid, or slowly as with age. The Lord wants to know: Do you love me? Or do you choose me only because of the gifts I give you? God wants to know if we would solely choose Him for who He is!
Let us choose the Lord even in the absence of the gifts. Let us be more grateful for the gifts we have received; such as family and friends, because in the end as the Scriptures point out in story of Job, the Lord gives and the Lord takes away (Job 1:21). Let us focus on the Giver of all gifts.
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